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Writers Joseph Balsamo and Peter Ciancarelli say the network ripped off The League from their The Commissioner. In a nine-page civil complaint (read it here) filed last week in New York, the pair claim FX and League co-creator-executive producer Jeff Schaffer, also named as a defendant, lifted significant elements of the duo’s series about a group of friends who form a fantasy football league. “Given the numerous and striking similarities between the two works, there can be no dispute that defendants Schaffer and/or FX had access to and copied protectable elements of the treatment,” the suit says. The suit then outlined 10 similarities between the two works. The plaintiffs filed Commissioner with the WGA back in 2006 and put the script online soon afterwards in an effort to attract attention. The League, created by Schaffer and wife Jackie Marcus Schaffer (who is not named as a defendant), has been on FX since October 2009.
Related: FX Renews ‘The League’ For Fourth Season
Claiming “irreparable damage as a consequence of their inability to market the treatment to television producers and networks with interest in their work”, the plaintiffs are seeking unspecified damages based on profits derived from the infringement as well as legal fees. The fourth season of The League debuts on FX on October 11. Plaintiffs are represented by Anthony Mango of the New York firm Mango & Iacoviello.
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Can they prove Schaefer saw their script online? No??? Guess what — it’s called group think. It’s all the same idea.
As someone who’s going into week 3 with problems with my running back (Forte), I have to say these guys are grasping at straws. That’s not a unique plot point.
Chuck Zito actually pitched a motorcycle gang saga to FX before Kurt Sutter, and we all saw how far that got him. This is DOA.
Move on, come up with a novel idea. Try again.
“a strip bar visit where the characters are more into their game than the girls.”
Whoa, what an original idea. I’ve never seen that premise before, ever.
OMG! A show about fantasy football had a story about the characters having issues with their running backs? Or guys being more into their fantasy teams than girls? Pretty sure ANY series/movie about this subject would have those storylines. Not specific at all.
There have been dozens of projects in development (both TV and film) about fantasy football, and The League was the one to actually come into fruition…so these amateurs (who puts a script online to get attention anyway??) really think they were the only ones to have that idea? Ugh. This suit will get thrown out WITH prejudice and no one will ever hear from these jokers again.
They won’t hand over any copies but they no doubt saw it online from a Google search. They were stupid to use anything identifiable from what was on the web but thieves always make dumb mistakes that give them away.
I’m not joking – FX counsel should contact me to testify. Because the 10 events that happen in both scripts happened to me in REAL LIFE.
Guess what, geniuses? You wrote the most obvious first choices possible with this script:
1. “A group of friends compete in fantasy football with a comedic twist.” (As opposed to fantasy leagues that only have 1 person and he is a stranger and they aren’t fun or funny).
2. “Siblings are included.” yeah, jack-off. My brother and I have been in the same league since I don’t know, everyone’s brother was in their legue.
3. “A reigning champion has won the league 2 years in a row.” Try three times for my league’s commissioner. I hate that prick.
4. The reigning champion has issues with his running back in week 3.
Are you %$#@ing with me? Are you? ARE YOU %$#@ING S&%TTING ME HERE?
Exhibit A: Jamaal Charles.
Exhibit B: Matt Forte
Exhibit C: Fred Jackson.
All three got injured. All three were on championship teams last year. Of course running backs get injured. It’s what they &%$#ing do. This is getting retarded.
5. “Arch rivals play each other for the right to go to the championship, and the loser freaks out.” Yeah. That’s what you do when you lose. You freak out. And EVERYONE is an arch rival in longstanding leagues, you nutwasher.
6. “Characters who are aspiring entertainers…go through life aloof without focusing on fantasy football.” As opposed to all of those super-on-the-ball aspiring artists. Guess what? We had to kick my brother, a – gasp! – aspiring artist, out of the league for failing to set lineups.
7. “Owners and the commissioner dispute over a waiver-wire process.” Oh…I get it! An argument is so fucking novel that only a team of literary geniuses could have dreamed it in their imagination land! We had a three-week, 229 email argument over free agency. Once again, my life has been hacked!
8. “During the playoffs, league members go to a bar to watch the games and tensions are high.” HAHAHHAHAHHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHAHA DEAR GOD LET ME BE IN THE COURTROOM WHEN YOU READ THAT OUT LOUD TO A JUDGE.
9. “The Fantasy Draft is held in Las Vegas.” LAS VEGAS? FANTASY? GROWN MEN WATCHING SPORTS AND GETTING DRUNK? THESE THINGS SIMPLY DON’T GO HAND-IN-HAND EVER!! I am once again looking forward to my draft in Vegas next year.
10. “The characters are so enamored with fantasy that even the allure of beautiful dancers won’t pull them away.” this is the simplest extrapolation of the danger of fantasy football ever. ‘you guys wouldn’t stop talking fantasy football even if there were naked women here!’ Chalk this up to, “how could anyone ever write a strip club scene into a Las Vegas show?”
Once again, I have no dog in the hunt. But this was just effing comical.
A concept for a 1/2 hr comedy about fantasy football as fantasy football was exploding in the mid-late 2000s isn’t exactly novel. THE LEAGUE is all about the specificity of the characters. I’d be curious to see how the characters in THE COMMISSIONER were written. Otherwise, this could absolutely be as simple as being beaten to the punch.
Are you kidding me? As part of two different Fantasy Football leagues at least 8/10 of each of the “plot points” exist in EVERY league. Seriously… brother’s playing in the same league is suppost to be an original concept? An aloof player making it farther than they should (even notch the aspiring singer/actor/artist one on that)? And even the most specific of the complaints, holding your draft in Vegas is pretty much the most common place every league thinks of, because it’s the holy ground for gambling. The rest: reigning champions, waiver wire bickering, going to a bar to watch a game, using girls to try and distract other players and even passing on female advances because you’re too focused on your lineup…. that’s all weekly occurrences in all Fantasy Football leagues. Now executing a common concept in a hilarious and well produced tv show, that’s an original and rare occurrence.
I disagree. Several of the points you mention don’t seem so obvious to me. I think they may have a case, and you helped make it for them.
The fact is that they waited until nearly the start of season 3 to bring this suit about. That alone says that even these guys weren’t sure enough that The League had ripped them off, either that or they were waiting to see if it had legs so that they could try to swoop in for a potentially big payday. Either way, it seems like a moot point on the side of the writers of The Commissioner since it these “similarities” are not distinct enough. The defendant can and will probably argue that these “similarities” are natural progressions based on the theme of the series. I mean, how long can you go on a show about football without hitting any of these so-called “similarities”? This will determine their suit.
Um, its almost Season 4, genius!
I’m not an all caps kind of guy, but aspiring writers, DON’T PUT YOUR SCRIPTS ONLINE. Once more for emphasis: DO NOT PUT YOUR SCRIPTS ONLINE.
Did these guys get ripped off? I dunno. Maybe. It happens. These online script-posting services are occasionally trolled by producers looking for concepts and throughlines to claim as their own. It’s insane to post your work online for all to see.
Amen. Writers, if you don’t respect your own work, no one else will.
Sorry but that civil complaint is funnier than any pilot these guys probably ever wrote. Every “original” idea, plot point, or character happens EVERY day in the lives of 90% of the population that plays fantasy football in the world. These guys have NO case whatsoever. I am sure they probably did write a fantasy football pilot like the 1000′s of other hack writers in this town that have a fantasy football pilot. But guess what? Their script didn’t make the cut b/c it takes more than a script to get a show off the ground. And definitely more creativity than this “original” plot point:
“During the playoffs, league members go to a bar to watch the games and tensions are high.”
ROTFL. literally.
I don’t think the online posting is the issue. True it makes for easy (and anonymous) pickings, but the nature of the business is that material is distributed to many people and places so the opportunity for having ideas stolen exists and it always has. But despite paranoia of newbie writers, it’s pretty rare. Having said that, I am certain that this was pure coincidence as many posters have said–a ‘zeitgeist’ idea. Also, why did it take these guys three YEARS to sue?? Were they just waiting for the inevitable ‘similarities’ that could arise after 36 episodes? anyway, good luck on this one–they’ll never be able to prove it, even if it happened which I’m sure it didn’t. Move on! Write something new–and write a script!
You pitch a story and leave behind a treatment. The network passes. Then a year or two later, after the general idea has been rumbling around in their heads, the executives who barely remember you ask a writer-of-the-moment “could you do something with this idea we have for a story about…?” (Does everyone see where I am going?) And he says, yeah, we could do this and that. They go into development. Was the original guy ripped off? Not precisely. Could the original guy feel sad, absolutely. Does it rise to the level of a legal action? Apparently they think so. The argument here from many posters is that it is a kind of inevitable discovery wherein anyone, anywhere would inevitably write the same characters or situations given the basic premise, which of course is unprotected under US copyright law. So, it follows I guess that nothing can be protected ever, it’s just the guy who gives the better pitch at the right moment in time.
Maybe they waited 3 years because they don’t sit around watching TV all day and were unaware of the actual specifics of the show until it was brought to their attention. I for one had never heard of “The League” until it was well into the 2nd season! This case is 100% valid and I hope these dudes give the people at FX a run for their money!!!! It’s BS that writers can’t trust these sites to post their ideas for fear of situations exactly like this!!!
If this is a hassle at all for the people who run The League, I’m all for it. They deserve it.
I agree. Karma is a B*tch.
This is hysterical!!!!! FX unleashes their bloggers!!!!! LMAO!!!! Pathetic. I think these guys have a chance here.
The creators of the league and FX should have to pay for this hidious crime. This has pure robbery written all over it. The writers of the Comissioner should be paid for their suffering and inability to market their project or become the new writers of the League, since their current writers suck.
Yours truely,
FX Theives
Other notable similarities:
1.) The show contains male characters
2.) The “Fantasy Football” takes place on computers and/or mobile phones
3.) Characters frequenty converse in English
4.) Actors are of the human race
I think this suit is a Hail Mary pass and will likely be thrown out of court, but a couple of points worth making. As previously posted, DO NOT POST YOUR SCRIPT ONLINE. DEFINITELY register whatever you have with the WGA before showing it to anyone who is not your mother or wife (girlfriends come and go). If you have written something of quality or with commercial appeal a good agent or manager will recognize this and want to work with you. Make your mission to get it to a good agent or manager. Take comfort in the knowledge that hundreds of marginally talented writers are repped by impressive names with great connections so if you have done something truly special they will come looking for you. TV is tough because pitches and pilot scripts are based on a concept much more than a story and there are only so many ideas out there. Finally, if you genuinely believe you have been ripped off (and I think need to be able to prove the writers or prods, etc. clearly had access to your work) think three times before suing. Even if you win, people will remember you as the guy who sued and fairly or not may be hesitant to work with you.
Ok, so which party wrote all the non-sensical fart, poop, sexually deviant, and vomiting storylines? This could have been a GREAT series, with so many guys-and gals-who could relate to them, and their leagues, but the plots that DON’T contain football are absolutely AWFUL! ESPECIALLY with a young girl involved in it-WTF? Stick to the NFL, and leave the disgusting “humor” out of it!
Interestingly, with some rewrites, several of these would pertain to Friends.
1) A group of friends have known each other for years and come together in odd and fractious ways.
2) Siblings are included in the group of friends.
3) A reigning champion has consistently won a competition (Monica used to always win at football and wrestling)
4) Can’t help with number 4
5) Rivals compete over something that they love (Joey and Chandler compete over a dutch girl, Joey and Ross compete over Heidi Klum). In both cases, the loser freaks out.
6) Both shows contain aspiring entertainers who are a little “out there” and don’t know what’s going on.
7) Can’t help with number 7
9) An event critical to the show is held in Vegas (Ross and Rachel get married in Vegas).
10) The characters are so consumed with things that they are distracted from the women at the strip club (Chandler goes with the girls to get his mind off Kathy and no one pays attention to the girls but they get tips on home-ec)
Sad…
By the way, filing your script with the WGA doesn’t do shit, except give the WGA a little income.
Register the copyright, folks. It’s easy, cheap, and gives you actual legal rights. Go to http://www.copyright.gov.
Registering your script with the WGA provides evidence that you have written what you say you have as of the date it was registered. If someone claims a script you wrote as their own, you can pull the script from the WGA to prove you wrote it. That is why it’s important to register your material before showing it to people in the industry. Copyright may provide more protection, but it is more expensive and a bigger hassle. The key is to have proof that you created something by a certain date.
Wow I agree with John. FX bloggers raise your hands! haha Only people on the dime would hate on something that looks pretty tight.
Can’t wait to see what happens.
Here is my problem with the lawsuit.
-The League is 85% improvised, so that throws some of the writing stuff out the window.
-The fact that one of the characters in The Commisioner “Bilbo” uses a nickname and Taco on The League both go by nicknames. I was always under the impression that Taco is his real name.
-The whole running back getting injured thing. Aren’t these actual players that actually got injured that week.
-They cited a “Season 1 Episode 13″ which did not exist. They probably meant “Season 1 Episode 3″, but I believe that typo throws that part of the argument out.
-The dancer in the season 2 finale was not angry at the guys for not paying attention, she just wanted money and they paid and she was happy.
-Why have they not come forward earlier?
-These seem like things that would happen in the majority of fantasy football leagues.
-Not all of the characters hate each other. Pete and Kevin are shown to be extremely close friends (Kevin tells Pete he loves him in the first episode), Kevin and Jenny are married, etc. The only character this really applies to is Ruxin, who nobody really likes and he doesn’t really like any of them.
-There are 3 sets of brothers that make up the league in the commissioner. The League has two characters (Kevin and Taco) who are brothers, and the fact that they are related is rarely mentioned.
-The script is not copyrighted.
-There is no proof that Jeff Schaeffer did not just hear about the idea from a friend who never mentioned he or she read the script, and decided to make a show based on this.
-The League isn’t really a show about a fantasy football league. The are in one, but it is mainly a show about a group of friends, sort of a male Cougar Town (or just Cougar Town, as the majority of the cast is male).
-Taco’s line about wanting to win the Shiva Bowl in Season 1 was most likely improvised. And he didn’t “not realize” he wasn’t in the playoffs, he probably didn’t realize they were still going on. Or did not realize they were required. Plus the line was barely relevant to the plot.
I could go on forever.
The League based on the life of the creator and his friends who have been in fantasy football league since before these bozos were born. I can’t wait until it’s taken to court for these morons to be humiliated to think this is based on their script.
I just skimmed through the complaint and it looks pretty damn good. I would be shaking in my FX boots. BTW what real person has time to play lawyer and outline the whole complaint against these guys. Wouldn’t the majority of people be for them? Posts from Teddy,Ben, Jeff and Zachary….if you are real people then it’s time to get out from your mommy’s basement and stop drinking the hater-aide.
The same type of basement ‘loser’ that skims a lawsuit that has nothing to do with them?
i am learning stuff about comedy by reading the complaint.
for example. the idea of “bilbo” winning without realizing it, is not as funny as the idea of that character suddenly getting pumped up for the playoffs without realizing he’s been eliminated.